


The Quick Brown Fox

by GeneralIrritation



Series: Eight-Oh-Three [2]
Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types, DCU (Comics)
Genre: F/M, also there is a cannibal, bonding time between Babs and Cass
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-22
Updated: 2019-04-22
Packaged: 2020-01-23 22:34:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 19,378
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18559267
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GeneralIrritation/pseuds/GeneralIrritation
Summary: Still reckoning with her new life, Barbara Gordon is given a task by Bruce Wayne.To look after a young woman who calls herself "Orphan."thegeneralreturns.tumblr.com





	The Quick Brown Fox

**SABERHAGEN MEAT PACKING PLANT - FIVE YEARS AGO**

Old Industrial, a ragged bit of coastline on Gotham’s north side, was home to the remnants of Gotham City’s industrial age.  The very concrete that comprised its streets seemed to give off a hallucinatory patina of a bygone era when nine-to-fivers lugged their lunch pails to the thousands of factory jobs that this stretch of city once provided.  When they’d knock off after the whistle blew to go to bars where beers cost twenty-five cents. When these same workers cut their bar time off earlier than they’d have liked to make it home to watch Johnny Carson’s opening monologue with their wives after the kids were asleep.

Those days were gone, now.

The factory jobs left.

The supervillains moved in.

Old Industrial, past the time when the companies that owned these factories moved to both automation and cheaper countries, always gave the impression of being haunted.

Batgirl knew this was right.  It’s just that the things haunting these old buildings were still very much alive.

She knew that Old Industrial had a habit of acting as a nest for whatever costumed wackjob that needed a secret lair from which they could plan their operations and house their filthy, degenerate henchmen.

As was the case tonight.

Perched atop the Saberhagen Meat-Packing Plant (rendered defunct some sixteen years ago now), Batgirl sat perched in the shadows, clad in black armor, the only splashes of color on her person being the yellow of her boots, on the inside of her cape, the broad Bat insignia on the armor covering her chest.  Autumn rain beaded and slid down the side of her cowl.

She was waiting.

Waiting for the two thumps on the rooftop behind her.

She knew who would she would see even before she stood and turned.

Batman and Robin.

She looked at the short kid in red and yellow standing next to the tall man in black and gray, and her stomach frowned.

This was the new Robin.

Dick had told her about the blowout between he and Bruce over a phone conversation some weeks ago.  In the background, she could hear his girlfriend Koriand’r (Starfire of the Teen Titans), ask who he was talking to.

And Dick said he was talking to his friend Barbara, just like a good and faithful boyfriend should.

Just the concept of Dick Grayson being a good and faithful boyfriend to someone who wasn’t her made Batgirl’s stomach fall further.

“What’s your name?” Batgirl asked.

“Robin,” Robin said.

Batgirl rolled her eyes.  Batman looked down at him disapprovingly.

“Has anyone ever told you that no one likes a smart-ass?” Batgirl asked.

“No,” Robin said.  “Because everyone _loves_ a smart-ass.  But it’s Jason.  Jason Todd. What’s yours?”

“Batgirl.”

Robin glowered behind his little domino mask.  “See, it’s stuff like _that…”_

“Robin,” Batman said.  It was soft, but there was some iron in it.  And Robin fell silent.

Batman walked up to Batgirl.

“Her name’s Matilda Mathis,” he said.  “Goes by _‘Dollhouse.’_  She--”

“I read the file,” Batgirl said.  “Dollmaker’s kid? Organ dealer?”

“Then you know why I have to ask you what I have to ask you,” Batman said.  “Are you sure you’re up for this?”

Batgirl felt a small blossom of rage beneath her ribs.  She’d only been Batgirl for a relatively short time, sure, but that was no excuse to treat her like a child.

“Did you ask Robin whether or not he was too prissy and delicate to fight the serial killer?” Batgirl asked, unable to keep the edge out of her voice.

“Yes,” Batman said.  “And if Dick were wearing the costume, I’d ask him the same thing.”

Batman locked eyes with her.  “Batgirl… Barbara… You have no idea how bad this can get.”

Batgirl sneered at him.

“Try me.”

* * *

**DINI’S - NOW**

It was the tail end of the lunch rush at Dini’s in midtown.  This upscale eatery was thankfully spared the widespread rioting and chaos of the occupation of Gotham City by the costumed villain known as The Undying, whose reign lasted only thirty-nine hours, and was brought to an end by Batman, Catwoman, Nightwing, and Oracle three short weeks ago.

Zatanna got reservations for herself, and Barbara Gordon.

Barbara sat at a table for two across from Zatanna, looking about at the rapidly thinning population of the restaurant around them.  Her right knee kept bobbing up and down.

It was a habit she’d had before The Joker put her in a wheelchair, and now that she was out of it, that habit picked right the hell back up.

Zatanna, for her part, looked thinner that Barbara was used to seeing her.  She had been starved by The Undying and Black Manta and used as a weapon against the people of Gotham City.  A weapon that claimed quite a few lives.

Barbara didn’t know how Zatanna had reacted to being told that she had, in essence, murdered eight people.

Barbara didn’t care.

She saw Zatanna gingerly dig into her mushroom lasagna, and took the time to perform a cursory examination.

Zatanna had apparently bought a pair of black slacks and a gray turtleneck sweater that fit her diminished frame in the time since Barbara had seen her last, which had been three weeks ago when Zatanna had, through her powers of magic, given Barbara back the use of her legs.  It was something done without Barbara’s consent, and this little lunch date was a part of the Zatanna Zatara Apology Tour.

As Zatanna took her time chewing her food, Barbara delved deeper into examination.

Zatanna’s makeup was unerringly applied, either through magic or the old fashioned way.  Every gesture, even while chewing her food, was mannered and practiced.

She had even bought extensions to put in her hair to replace the clumps that had fallen out during her thrall to The Undying.  She didn't even magic her hair back so no one could tell.  Clearly the act of someone who wanted the sympathy.

 _It's all an act,_ Barbara thought.

Barbara thought it might be like this.  Even under the best of circumstances, Barbara Gordon’s opinion of Zatanna veered from _“Well, she’s spent all of her life as a stage magician, so she has every gesture down cold,”_ to _“She’s fake.”_  And this was decidedly not the best of circumstances.

She knew Zatanna was a vegetarian, so when the waiter came to take their orders, Barbara ordered a steak done as rare as the kitchen staff thought they could legally get away with.  Just to put Zatanna on edge.

Barbara knew she was petty.

And Barbara didn’t care about that, either.

Zatanna swallowed the bit of food she was eating.

“I need to tell you how sorry I am,” Zatanna said.  “In hindsight, y’know. In ways that are obvious to me now, but weren’t obvious to me then, I took liberties with your body.  Liberties that you told anyone who would listen that you did not want taken with it. Liberties I didn’t ask you if it was okay to take.  I blame the stress at the time…”

Barbara stopped cutting her meat. _Careful, Zee_.

“... but I also blame my own thoughtlessness.”  

Barbara resumed cutting her meat.   _That’s better._

“It was… It was unbecoming of me,” Zatanna said.  “Of the kind of friend I try to be. So… again… I apologize.  And I hope you can forgive me.”

Barbara put the meat she cut into her mouth, and chewed _slooooooowly,_ letting the moment and the suspense last for all it was worth, watching Zatanna try not to squirm.  But eventually, Barbara swallowed, and said:

“No.”

Then she started cutting her steak again.

Zatanna squinted in disbelief.  “What?”

“Never accept an apology that someone practiced in front of a mirror the night before,” Barbara said.  “I know you like working from a script, you being on stage and all, but shit like this you have to improvise.  It’s more genuine that way.”

Zatanna’s genteel veneer finally snapped, and even before she said anything, Barbara knew the two of them were getting somewhere.

“Now listen, Goddammit,” Zatanna said, trying to keep her voice down.  “I get that you don’t like people screwing with you without permission.  But if I did ask permission, then Black Manta would have run one of his blades through Selina Kyle’s head.  You saw how close to her face that blade was. We didn’t have a second to spare.”

In the plus column of events that occurred from Zatanna fiddling with the body of Barbara Gordon, the prolonged existence of Selina Kyle was the one Barbara didn’t have an answer for.  Selina had thanked Barbara for coming to the rescue in the Batgirl cowl, including a brief phone conversation where Selina thanked Barbara repeatedly and profusely. And the longer that conversation went on, the more Barbara got the feeling that Selina had just slept with, or was about to sleep with, Bruce Wayne for the first time after eleven years of waiting.  

First, _ew._  

Second, apparently this new and improved Bruce Wayne that Bruce said he was going to be was an actual real thing.

It was evidently extremely important that Selina called Barbara to thank her like that, as Barbara had no idea how Selina had gotten her number.

“And do I have to tell you what I’ve gone through the past three weeks?” Zatanna asked.  “I was interviewed by Gotham PD for three hours when I was on an IV drip in the hospital, because they thought I collaborated with The Undying and Black Manta to murder people with my magic.  I… I _killed_ people, Barbara, and I wasn’t even in control of my body when it happened.  If you’ve been starved for a few days, only to be told that you’re responsible for the deaths of eight people, would you really feel like eating?  I’ve had to force myself to, and I have no clue what kind of psychological damage that’s gonna do. So don’t act like you’re the only one who’s had a rough month.”

Barbara blinked.  “Oh yeah?”

She brought her plate forward, so she could put her elbows on the table and lean in.

“I park in disabled parking spaces,” Barbara said, “only to have to pull back out again when I realize I’m not disabled anymore.  You’d think eidetic memory would cover that, but...”

Zatanna stared at her.  “I pour my heart out, and you come to me with _that?”_

“Of all the problems I have,” Barbara said, “that’s the least of them.  More of a minor annoyance, really. But if you wanna get bigger, we can get bigger.”

Barbara sighed before she said “I had to forge my medical records and switch doctors because literally walking into my old doctor’s office would raise too many questions.  But we can get so much bigger than that.”

She folded her arms.  “My father cried in my arms for an hour when he saw I was out of the wheelchair.”

Zatanna’s face slackened, and Barbara could see some shame creep back in.

“Now that sounds great,” Barbara said, “old school guy like that being in touch with his feelings enough to cry in front of his own daughter.  But James Gordon was a Green Beret. A cop in Chicago before he came here. Police commissioner and mayor of this shithole city. Guy never gave an inch my entire life, but me just _standing_ there caused him to just dissolve, and… and things _change_ for someone after that.  And holding him all that time, I knew what he was thinking.  His daughter was _whole._  She was _back._  Even though I was never broken and I never went anywhere.”

Barbara took a deep breath.  “But if you want to go bigger… we can go bigger.”

She leaned her face on her left hand.  “Let’s talk about how everyone else in the League has reacted to all this.”

Barbara stared into Zatanna’s slightly moistening blue eyes before she continued.

“I have gotten emails from a ton of people in the past three weeks, people who have known me for years, people who know how I tick.  And they all say things like _'Congratulations.'  'Glad to have you back.'  'Your prayers have been answered.'_ And I’m talking people who are really important to me.  People like Dinah and Kara. Hell, Roy Harper wrote me, telling me he was glad to see me back on my feet again.  Now I know Roy didn’t mean anything by it, I can forgive Roy for being a dumbass. Roy wouldn’t have any friends if people couldn’t forgive occasional stupidity.  In fact, the only two people who haven’t rubbed me the wrong way about all this are my boyfriend and Clark. But you know what all this tells me?”

Zatanna didn’t say anything.

“It tells me,” Barbara said, “that I spent four years in that chair trying to prove my worth.  Getting into the League, getting a law degree, running my own team, being the intelligence backbone for a worldwide network of superheroes, trying and trying every single Goddamned day… and they _still_ pitied me.”

Zatanna actually flinched at that.  Barbara leaned back in her seat.

“I’m not gonna say you don’t have it rough right now,” Barbara said.  “But I am saying that you are going to be surrounded by friends who see you for who you are, and are going to be on your wavelength.  They’re going to tell you it’s not your fault. They’re going to get it right when those same friends are gonna look at me and get it wrong.  Revealing a truth to me that quite frankly I was better off not knowing.”

Barbara put her elbows on the arms of her seat and rested her chin two intertwined, clenched fists.

“So here’s how it’s gonna go.  I will be civil towards you. I will work with you.  But I will not accept your apology, because in the back of your head, you’re going to keep wondering why you have to apologize at all.  I am not forgiving you. I am not your fucking friend.”

Barbara looked over the rim of her glasses at Zatanna.

“So we’re gonna sit here in silence, finish our meals, and then we’ll leave.  It’s on me.”

Zatanna’s voice cracked when she tried to say “You don’t hav--”

“Yes,” Barbara said, “I will.  You done enough, Zatanna. You _really_ have.”

* * *

**THE CLOCK TOWER**

The Gotham Clock Tower was built by Wayne Enterprises twenty-two years ago on the edge of the East End as an attempt to beautify that particular section of the city, as well as act as a vanguard of the new jobs that would further enrich the area’s populace.

But the East End wanted neither to be beautified or enriched, as the vandalism and theft of construction equipment clearly demonstrated.

So the Clock Tower sat on the edge of the East End, empty for eighteen years.

Until Barbara Gordon moved in.

Given to her free of charge by Bruce Wayne, Barbara used the top three floors of the Gotham Clock Tower to use as her headquarters as Oracle, as well as acting as a base of operations for the three-woman superhero team known as the Birds of Prey.  The very top floor was Oracle’s work space, for her computer equipment, as well as a gym. The floor beneath that was nothing but bedrooms and a kitchen area, both for herself and for any stray individual in a cape or a mask who needed to spend a night or two in Gotham.  The floor beneath that was nothing but server towers, and every last room was meticulously climate-controlled.

Barbara had moved out of the Clock Tower a year ago when her father, James Gordon, had been elected mayor of Gotham City.  It was hard to do the top secret superhero intelligence thing when one’s father would have insisted upon a twenty-four hour security detail.  So it was to Bludhaven, and her boyfriend’s cramped apartment, for our young Miss Gordon.

However, while putting the city back together after the occupation of The Undying, Mayor Gordon announced that he would resign the office of mayor to once again take the role as Gotham City’s police commissioner.  There were five weeks left to go until that happened, and security details were no longer an insistence, so Barbara felt the time was right to move back from Bludhaven to Gotham, leaving Dick Grayson behind to continue his job hunt.

She had been looking forward to working the heavy bag that was still hanging in the top floor gym.

Particularly after her lunch date with Zatanna.

As soon as she got back up to bedroom floor, she flew out of her flats, out of her gray slacks, out of her blue button-up, and into a pair of staggeringly hideous floral print tights that she hadn’t worn since high school.

Wearing those tights and a pair of white sneakers, along with a black sports bra, up to the top floor she went to pummel the living hell out of the lumpy, well-worn Everlast punching bag.  

She didn’t keep track of time.  The only thing telling her that she’d been working more than ten minutes was the thick coat of sweat that was forming on her chest and her back.

When her bare knuckles were red and raw, she started laying in the kicks.

_Don’t think about how I couldn’t do this three weeks ago, don’t even think about it at all._

But Barbara had to think about it when the charley horse bloomed angry and sudden on the back of her right thigh.

She clutched at her leg.  The pain was so vivid that she felt her words slowly spill out of her mouth like stale, thick tomato soup.

_“Ohhhhhh, fuuuuuuck meeeeeeee….”_

She hobbled over to the nearest chair she could find, and rubbed the back of her right leg for about a minute, until the pain subsided.

And it was only when the pain went away that she realized where she was sitting.

She was sitting in her wheelchair.

The last time she used it to get around was three weeks ago, in the R&D basement of Wayne Tower.  She left the wheelchair to get into the Batmobile.

So she could be Batgirl one more time.

She saved the city.  She turned off the targeting system that the Undying was using to make Zatanna Zatara into a weapon that could dissolve people in green flame.

 _But no one wants to talk about_ that, _now do they?_   Barbara thought.   _No congrats on saving nine million people, just the thing that was done to me against my will._

After the chaos with The Undying, Barbara walked into the R&D lab to a visibly shocked Lucius Fox, and carried the wheelchair out under her arm.  She couldn’t push it, as she’d had the handles on the back removed. She did not like to be pushed.

Barbara sighed.

“I’m certain this is symbolic of something,” Barbara said aloud to no one but herself.  “Of _what,_ I have no clue.”

Her phone rang.

Barbara got out of the wheelchair and walked to the desk where the phone was.  She picked it up, looked at the screen, and answered.

“Hello, Bruce.”

Bruce Wayne’s gravelly Superhero Business voice came into her ear.  “Hello, Barbara. I trust you’re well.”

“Not as well as you, I hear.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Were you the one who gave Selina my number?” Barbara asked.  “Or did she get it from Dick?”

Bruce Wayne was a unique man, as his silent verbal constipation was somehow audible.

Barbara snorted.  This was something she needed today.

“You just checking in?”

“No,” Bruce said.  “There’s… someone I’d like you to meet.”

“Okay.”

“At the manor.”

“O--”

_“Now.”_

Barbara blinked.  He dropped his voice an octave: The verbal sign that Batman meant business.

“Okay,” Barbara said.  “Just let me hop in the shower, and I’ll be right over.”

* * *

**WAYNE MANOR**

In one of the many bedrooms in the east wing of the stately and spacious Wayne Manor, Barbara Gordon and Bruce Wayne stood in the doorway, and looked at its occupant.

It was an Asian girl, about five three by Barbara’s estimation.  She had a mop of lank, black hair and a pair of slightly chubby cheeks that contradicted how slender and coiled she was.  The girl was wearing a gray sweatshirt that must have been killing her in the August heat, as well as a pair of baggy blue jeans and a pair of black Chuck Taylors.

Barbara noticed that all of the clothes the girl was wearing appeared to be brand new, suggesting that Bruce had bought these clothes for her.

She also noticed the plain white cast around the girl’s right forearm.

As the girl looked around the opulent room in which she sat, Barbara looked at Bruce, standing next to her.  She tapped him on the shoulder and guided him further into the hallway.

“Okay,” Barbara said.  “First thing’s first: Why is she wearing a sweatshirt in August?”

Bruce sighed.  “Her body is covered in scars.  Cuts, burns, gunshot wounds. If I were to write a book on skin trauma, the girl in there would be the only source I need.  And those clothes are the only clothes she’d wear.”

Barbara felt her skin crawl.  “Okay, who is she?”

“Last night,” Bruce said, “I got word of a street gang working a warehouse near the harbor.  I get there as Batman, only to find twenty unconscious gang members and that girl the only one standing.”

“Who helped her?” Barbara asked.  “She couldn’t have taken on twenty people.  No one can.”

“That’s what I thought,” Bruce said, and he reached into his dark blue sport coat for his phone.  He queued something up, before handing the phone to Barbara.

“The warehouse had a surveillance feed,” Bruce said.

What Barbara saw on Bruce’s phone, she could just barely believe.  The girl in that room zipped back and forth between gang members with an outrageous speed, punching and kicking them unconscious with the same kind of absent efficiency that bureaucrats use when stamping forms.

Barbara couldn’t even get the words out.  “I… This is…”

“Don’t blink,” Bruce said.  “You’ll miss the best part.”

Over at the corner of the fame, Barbara noticed one of the gang members pulling a gun.  The girl on the feed seemed to notice it too.

The warehouse went white with muzzle-flash, and…

“That can’t be right,” Barbara said.  She rewound the last couple of second of footage, and watched it again.

Then she watched it a third time, her jaw gradually dropping once the gravity of what she had just seen finally sank in.

 _“That girl in there dodged a bullet,”_ Barbara said.

“I know,” said Bruce.

 _“After_ it left the chamber!”

“I know.”

“Who the hell _is_ she?”

Barbara handed him back his phone, and Bruce said “I get to the warehouse, and I walk up to her.  She sees the Bat symbol on my chest, and…”

“And what?” Barbara asked.

“She… genuflected,” Bruce said.

Barbara didn’t even know what to say to that.

“Like she was in church,” Bruce said.

Barbara collected her thoughts.  “Does this girl have a name?”

“And that’s another thing,” Batman said.  “I asked her. She just said… _‘Orphan.’”_

“Orphan,” Barbara repeated back to him, thinking the girl had the absolute worst taste in superhero names given who she had been speaking to, or she had the most passive-aggressive parents ever to walk the earth.

“What else does she have to say for herself?” Barbara asked.

“Nothing,” Bruce said.  “Not a word. _‘Orphan’_ is the only word I’ve ever heard her speak.  I took her to Leslie in Crime Alley to have her examined, and to have her treated for her broken arm.  She had her vision tested, and… I’m fairly certain she can’t talk, but I know for a fact she can’t read.”

“Christ,” Barbara said.  “Wait, how did she get the broken arm?  Those bangers didn’t lay a finger on her.”

“I can only deduce that she’s been homeless for quite a few years,” Bruce said.  “She’s malnourished. She hit one of them so hard that she developed a hairline fracture in her ulna.”

“God _damn,”_ Barbara said, impressed.

Bruce put his hands on his hips.  “Go in there,” he said, “and introduce yourself.  Then bring her down into the cave to meet the others… please.”

Barbara just stared at Bruce.  He wasn’t the _“Please”_ type.  Dick said something about Bruce going into therapy, but she’d thought that was the kind of thing that wouldn’t take.  Bruce was Bruce, and Bruce was always going to _be_ Bruce.

“Alright,” Barbara said.

Bruce patted her on the shoulder and walked away, before she caught something and had another question.

_Wait, what do you mean “others?”_

Barbara tugged at her forest green turtleneck before putting her hands in the pockets of her jeans, and walked into the bedroom to make introductions.

She stood in the doorway.  Orphan zoned in on her immediately with a dissective gaze that made Barbara uncomfortable.

“Hey,” Barbara said.

Orphan said nothing, and remained perfectly still.

“I’m Barbara.  What’s your name?”

Orphan opened her mouth and said, in a low, craggy voice, “Orphan,” and Barbara immediately fought the urge to gawk.  This petite little Asian girl, sitting there with a cast on her arm, and when she opened her mouth, she sounded like an Ent from the _Lord of the Rings_ movies.

“Is it alright if I sit there on the bed next to you?” Barbara asked.

Orphan looked at the space on the bed next to her, looked back at Barbara, and shrugged her shoulders.

Barbara sat down next to her, and sighed.

_Why am I doing this?_

_What’s the point of this?_

_And what the hell do I_ say?

Barbara noticed Orphan looking at her, and she could tell that she was wondering the same thing.

“Been to the Batcave yet?”

Orphan furrowed her brow, and nodded her head.

“But you didn’t get, like, the tour or anything, did you?”

Orphan shook her head.

“Would you like one?” Barbara asked.

And a little smile crept across Orphan’s face.

* * *

**THE BATCAVE**

Barbara and Orphan boarded the elevator to the Batcave in the study, and took the ride down.

And what Barbara saw nearly took her breath away.

She had never recalled the Batcave having more than four people in it: Herself, either of the two Robins, Alfred, and Batman himself.

But today, herself and Orphan made nine.

Alfred was standing next to the Batcomputer.  A few feet away from him, there was Dick Grayson, her boyfriend.  He looked up at her and smiled a smile that she returned.

Dick himself was in close proximity to Tim Drake, the teenage boy who had not only deciphered the identities of herself, Dick, and Bruce, but had also provided the all-too-crucial break that allowed them to stop The Undying three weeks ago.

Tim was a little on the short side, handsome, with black hair and blue eyes.

 _I am becoming more and more convinced that Bruce gets his Robins from a clone farm,_ Barbara thought.

Yeah, that was the prevailing theory that Dick had: That Tim Drake was going to be the third Robin.  That explained why Dick was standing so close to him. Dick didn’t have the best relationship with Jason Todd before Jason was murdered by The Joker, and though he wouldn’t tell her that, Barbara knew that that was a fact that haunted him.  Dick was going to try to pull the big brother routine with Tim, which Barbara didn’t have a problem with. If Dick Grayson was half as good a big brother as he was a boyfriend, then Tim Drake was going to be well taken care of.

Tim Drake had his arm around the shoulders of a blonde-haired, blue-eyed, rather pretty girl his age that Barbara recognized as Stephanie Brown.  The young MIss Brown was Selina Kyle’s little disciple, and the first instinct Barbara had when she saw her with a theoretically prospective Robin’s arm around her was to glower.  She wasn’t proud of it, but there it was.

Any affection between Barbara and Dick in their Batgirl and Robin days was strictly verboten, lest the Batman himself descend upon them with a biblical fury.

_Just what the hell is going on here?_

Stephanie craned her head at the tall woman with short red hair standing next to her.

“I’m being trained by Catwoman,” Stephanie said.  “Who’s training you?”

“The United States Army,” the woman with red hair said.

“Ohhhhhhhh,” said Stephanie.  “So your costume’s just a little _less_ silly now.”

The woman with red hair glared at Stephanie, and at that mention of the Army, Barbara knew that the woman with the red hair was Kate Kane.

Bruce told her about this one.

Much like in the instance of Orphan, Batman had swooped in on a supposed base of operations a week and a half ago.  The Ventriloquist, real name Peyton Riley, had apparently opted not to go back to Arkham with most of the other patients after The Undying had been stopped.

Batman arrived on the scene, only to find five or six unconscious henchmen, and a woman in a skin tight suit, black cape, with flowing red hair and red Bat on her chest, slamming Peyton Riley’s head into a desk.

This brand-spanking new vigilante dropped the unconscious Ventriloquist, and beheld Batman.

Batman didn’t even have to hear her speak to know who she was.  He immediately took off his cowl and said _“Kate?”_

It turned out that Kate Kane, Bruce Wayne’s cousin, had gotten into the superhero business, calling herself _“Batwoman.”_

Barbara reckoned that annoying animatronic puppets were wrong about a lot of things, but were dead on the money in the assertion that it was, indeed, a small world after all.

As Kate groused, Barbara turned her head to see the two people standing in the middle of the cave, and…

Of _course._

Of _course_ this was the reason that the new Robin was allowed to engage in PDA with his girlfriend in the Batcave.

Because Batman was engaging in PDA with _his_ girlfriend in the Batcave.

Bruce Wayne had his arm around Selina Kyle’s shoulders, and Selina, on her part, had her arm around Bruce’s waist.

“So this is the Batcave,” Selina said.

“Yeah,” Bruce said.  “You like it?”

“Sure,” Selina said.  “I expected more bats in the Batcave, though.  It’s kinda disappointing.”

To which Bruce replied by simply pointing up to the ceiling.

Selina looked up and saw the undulating darkness above them.  The darkness that held the bats in the Batcave.

“Wow,” Selina said, apparently genuinely impressed.  She looked at Bruce, then back at the ceiling, and asked:

“How do you keep them from shitting everywhere?”

“Sonic emitters,” Bruce said.  “It wards them off the main floor.”

“Good,” Selina said.  “Because I have to tell you, Sailor, if you left poor Alfred to clean up bat shit, I’d have had to give you a stern talking to.”

“We have an agreement,” Bruce said.  “Any bats do their business on the main floor, and I’m the one to clean it up.”

Selina smiled.  “Aren’t you sweet?”

“Don’t tell anyone,” said Bruce.

“I’ll tell the world,” she said.  Selina got on her toes and kissed Bruce on the cheek.  Bruce removed his arm from her shoulders and started lightly scratching her back.  Selina closed her eyes.

And Barbara… could not… believe it.

Bruce Wayne was a secretive, paranoid, highly competitive, perfectionist, brooding, lonely… _asshole._  But this guy, standing in the middle of the Batcave, scratching Catwoman’s back after inviting what appeared, at first glance, to be the Off-Broadway cast of _Rent_ into his inner sanctum had apparently flayed the real Bruce alive and pranced about impersonating him, spreading good feelings and healthy interpersonal relationships around like a normal person.

And… And was he _smiling?_

He was _smiling!_

_If this were Hush, I wouldn’t be surprised._

Bruce looked over and saw Barbara and Orphan standing just outside the elevator.  He took in a deep breath to call them over, when--

“Whoa!”

Stephanie Brown broke ranks.  She escaped Tim Drake’s embrace and made a beeline straight toward them, a grin unfolding across her face.  She produced a black Sharpie from the breast pocket of the flannel shirt she was wearing.

And her eyes were on Orphan.

“Hi,” Stephanie said to Orphan.  “I’m Stephanie.”

Orphan regarded this strange creature Stephanie Brown like a new insect, waiting to be added to the taxonomy.  “Orphan,” she finally said.

“Wow,” Stephanie said.  Either you have a poor taste in superhero names given whose cave this is, or you have the most passive-aggressive parents on Earth.  Anyway, it’s just that it’s good luck to be the first person to sign someone’s cast, so…”

“It is?” Barbara asked.

“Sure it is,” Stephanie said, before turning her attention back to Orphan.  “Sooo… May I?”

Orphan looked at Barbara.

“This is on you,” Barbara said.

Orphan seemed to being flipping through the rolodex in her head of possible responses, before just giving up and nodding.

“Cool,” Stephanie said.  She uncapped her Sharpie, and scribbled on Orphan’s cast.

“Hey,” Kate called.  “You do realize that signing your real name on a vigilante’s cast is a dumb idea, right?”

“Which is why I signed my superhero name instead,” Stephanie said.

Barbara raised her eyebrows, and looked down at Orphan’s cast.

“Spoiler?” Barbara asked.

“Yup,” said Stephanie.  “Now I just need the costume.”

She turned her attention back to Orphan.  “I can’t tell you how glad I am that there’s another girl around here my age, ‘cause I am so gonna need someone to talk to.”

Stephanie stopped smiling when she turned around and saw everyone else in the room staring at her.

In defiance, Stephanie held up her Sharpie.

“Sign her cast, you _dumb whores!”_

And so all the dumb whores in attendance did indeed sign Orphan’s cast.  She’d collected signatures from Spoiler, Oracle, Catwoman, Nightwing, Batwoman, Robin, and even a Penny-One from Alfred.

With the force of a hurricane, and the grace of an elephant attempting ballet, Stephanie Brown did Barbara Gordon’s job for her, acclimating Orphan to everyone in the room.

 _Good job, Steph,_ Barbara thought.

As everyone was milling around, Dick hung back, with an arm around Barbara’s waist.

“I have to tell you something,” Dick said.

“Hold that thought,’ Barbara said.  “Are… Are we sure that’s actually Bruce?  Because a couple of therapy sessions and getting laid doesn’t just change someone overnight.”

“That’s what I thought,” Dick said.  “But then I remembered that… That Bruce Wayne likes to throw himself into the deep ends of things.  He’s not there yet, but he’ll do stuff like this to _convince_ himself he’s there.  Best case scenario, this sticks.  Worst case scenario, he retreats, and we’ll just have to be there for him, won’t we?”

It would not be the first time something like that would have happened.  That something massive would regress Bruce, and that Barbara and Dick would have to babysit the overgrown Toddler-Bat.  For someone who had a contingency plan for everything, Bruce Wayne sure as hell liked to roll dice with his own well-being.

Barbara nodded.  “Yeah… So what was it you wanted to tell me?”

Dick stood up straight.  “I got a job.”

Barbara smiled.  He’d been fired from his bartending job in Bludhaven, as he spent a week as Nightwing trying to fight The Undying.

“Nice,” Barbara said.  “Where?”

“You are looking at the new gymnastics teacher at Saint Afra’s Academy in Bludhaven.”

Barbara tilted her head a little.

“Isn’t, um… Isn’t that a girl’s school?”

“Well, yeah,” Dick said.  “But I have a couple of free periods a day.  I can just straight-up sleep in my office. That’s great for someone doing the superhero thing.”

“You’re burying the lede, here, hon,” Barbara said.  “I’m not sure I’m altogether secure with you spending your days surrounded by undersexed teenage Catholic girls.”

Dick put his hands on his hips.  “I told you this knowing full well that you’ll have the entire faculty, staff, and student body under a microscope the second I turn up for work on the first day.  Social security numbers, bank accounts, credit ratings.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Can any high school girl do that?”

“I dunno,” Barbara said.  “The next crop of supervillains have to come from somewhere.”

“Okay, are you busting my chops because I’m teaching at a girl’s school, or are you genuinely concerned?  Because you know chasing after teenage strange really isn’t my style.”

“I just know how teenage girls are,” Barbara said.

“So do I,” said Dick.  “I dated _you_ when you were a teenager.”

Barbara snickered.  “Dick… You know what I said.  You knew what I did. But you didn’t know what I was _thinking.”_

“I refuse to believe that teenage girls just lose all of their faculties and higher motor functions the second I enter a room,” Dick said.  “I mean… Y’know, I’m _alright,_ but seriously, this whole thing about me being attractive has just been blown way, _way_ out of proportion.  Just look at Orphan. She…”

Dick stopped after that.  Barbara looked at Orphan.

Her left arm was over her right shoulder, and her eyes were cloudily staring at Dick, as though she’d been ensorcelled.  Only after a second did Orphan realize what she was doing, and immediately avert her gaze to the floor.

So it was that Orphan had partaken in what was apparently a prerequisite ritual among teenage female crime fighters ( _and some of the males too,_ Barbara thought, _let’s be real here_ ): That of the monstrous crush on Richard John Grayson.

Barbara sighed.   _Welcome to the club, Orphan.  You’ll get your membership badge and free decoder ring in the mail in two to five business days._

Dick looked from Orphan to Barbara.  “Okay, bad example.”

From the middle of the room, Bruce called out.  “Can we begin now?”

Dick smiled, and kissed Barbara on the cheek.  “I’m gonna go over next to Tim.”

Barbara nodded as Dick left.  She looked down at Orphan, whose gaze had lifted temporarily from the floor of the Batcave to one particular part of Dick Grayson as he walked away.

“That’s my boyfriend,” Barbara said.

Orphan looked at her, registered this, and gave Barbara a thumbs up.

Barbara smiled.

Once everyone was situated, Bruce began to speak.

“I am not building an army,” Bruce said.  “None of you will be going to war in the streets of Gotham City in my name.  I want you to do this for your city, and doing that does not require an oath of fealty to me.”

Bruce scanned the eight other sets of eyes in the room.  “It wasn’t always this way. Time was, your complete and unwavering loyalty was a requirement.  The first two Robins and Batgirl would no doubt tell of me hectoring them, training them until they couldn’t stand up anymore, because they had meet my definition of perfection.”

He looked directly at Barbara.  “What was the name you called me behind my back?”

Barbara felt as though she’d been caught flat-footed. No sound came out of her mouth.

“It’s alright,” Bruce said with an uncharacteristic warmth.  “I know about it. You can say it.”

“We… We called you _‘Bat-Dick,’”_ Barbara finally said.  “Not to be confused with _‘Regular Dick,’_ which…”

Dick Grayson raised his hand and said “Hi, everyone!”

Selena and Stephanie snickered.  Kate at least smiled.

Bruce nodded.  “My way cannot be the only way.  I am… Imperfect. As is everyone.  As are all of you. My only hope is that we are all imperfect in different ways so our shortcomings can be compensated for by someone else.  I will not tell you to be perfect.”

He folded his arms.  “What if I told you there was a reward to this job?  More valuable than cash, and more precious than jewels.  Do you want to know what it is?”

The room was silent, and all eyes were on Bruce Wayne.

“Sleep,” Bruce finally said.

He let that sink in before he continued.

“Three weeks ago,” Bruce said, “when The Undying had this city in his grip, he said the only way he would stop would be if someone killed Batman.  He was lying, of course, but this city had no way of knowing that. The people of Gotham turned on each other, killing each other, and put them in imitations of my suit, my symbol, in hopes that The Undying would leave.  In hopes that this city would be saved. Do you know how many people were killed like this?”

No one said anything.

“Ninety-eight,” Bruce finally said.  “Ninety-eight people dead. Ninety-eight broken families.  Ninety-eight groups of friends staring down an empty stool at the bar.  Now, I have to ask you: Would this have happened in Metropolis under Superman?  Or in Keystone City under The Flash? Because I don’t think it would have. I have been second-guessing what I did wrong to set the kind of example that cost ninety-eight lives, I have been wondering what I could have done different the last thirteen years of being Batman, and the only thing I _haven’t_ been doing too much of in the last three weeks is _sleeping.”_

Bruce put his hands in his pockets.  “I will not tell you to be perfect. You will tell _yourselves_ to be perfect, because at the end of the night, all you really want to do is take off your costumes and go to bed.”

He let that hang in the air as well, before he continued.

“We are not an army.  I am not your General.  This is a network. A loose partnership.  Nightwing works Bludhaven. Catwoman wants to remain independent, and I’m sure Spoiler will be under her wing.  Batwoman wants to work on her own as well. Oracle runs her own team--oh, and by the way, I sent you a couple of names that you may want to look at.”

Barbara didn’t expect this.  “Uh… thanks?”

“You’re welcome,” Bruce said, before he turned to everyone else.  “All I want to be is a resource. If you need equipment, funding, intelligence, I am the one you go see.  I will be as hands-off as I possibly can. And… I am absolutely terrible at speeches, and I’m done now.”

The room collectively let out its breath.

“Well, that was chipper,” Stephanie said as she put her head on Tim’s shoulder.

Selina walked up to Bruce.  Barbara could hear what they were saying.

“Was that okay?” Bruce asked.

“You did great, Sailor,” Selina said, before softly kissing him on the lips.

As Kate, Tim, and Stephanie made their way to the elevator, Alfred stopped by Barbara and Orphan.

“Miss Orphan,” Alfred said.  “It was a pleasure to make your acquaintance, and should you find yourself in Wayne Manor again, I shall be most pleased to be at your disposal.”

Alfred gave a stiff bow, nodded to Barbara, and walked to the elevator, leaving Orphan in a state of visible confusion.

“The first rule in this wacky-ass life,” Barbara said to Orphan, “is that Alfred is a real one.  His hot chocolate is the _tits.”_

Orphan appeared to have no idea what this meant.

“Ohhh, right,” Barbara said.  “I was gonna give you a tour, wasn’t… I…”

Barbara looked from Orphan to the main floor of the Batcave, only to find Bruce standing right in front of them.

“I would like you to look after Orphan for a while,” Bruce said.  

Just like that.

Barbara made a face.  “I… beg your pardon?”

“I’m going to be busy for a spell, following up on what I can about her identity.  And I think your influence on her will be a good one.”

“As opposed to yours?” Barbara asked.

“Yes,” Bruce said.

Barbara wanted to tell him that that was an excellent point, but after his self-flagellating little speech, she didn’t feel like rubbing it in.

She looked down at Orphan.  “That sound good to you? I give you the Batcave tour, we get you something to eat, and you shack up with me for a bit?”

Orphan’s flat gaze moved from Barbara to Bruce.  For some strange reason, Barbara got the notion that while Orphan may have genuflected in the presence of Batman, she seemed less than impressed by Bruce Wayne.  

She held up her cast and Stephanie’s Sharpie (which Stephanie had failed to collect) up to him.  Barbara noticed that Orphan’s cast was not signed by Batman.

Barbara looked at Bruce and ginned, unable to stop what she was going to say next.

“You heard the lady.  Sign the cast, ya dumb whore.”

* * *

**BIG BELLY BURGER**

Barbara had given Orphan the tour of the Batcave.

She had told her that she was the first person to drive the new Batmobile three weeks ago.

She didn’t think Orphan believed her.

She told her that she was the first Batgirl.

She didn’t think Orphan believed that, either.

They got into Barbara’s blue 2015 Honda Accord, and headed for the city.

Barbara knew that Orphan needed something healthy in her stomach.  Barbara could also take a wild stab that the only thing she’d had to eat since last night was some of Alfred’s dreaded cucumber sandwiches.

And so, in what she considered a humanitarian crusade, Barbara took Orphan to the Big Belly Burger in Gotham Village.

They sat in the parking lot beforehand, with Barbara looking up the Big Belly Menu on her phone, and handing it to Orphan.

“Just scroll down till you find something that looks tasty,” she said.

Orphan settled on the Number Four: The mushroom and swiss burger with the medium fries and drink.

As they walked to the restaurant, Barbara asked Orphan if she’d ever had a chocolate milkshake before.

Orphan shook her head.

Barbara thought it might be best for Orphan to be around people, so they ate inside.  She asked Orphan to pick a table while she went and got the food.

She watched Orphan eat as she picked at her garden salad.

And by God and all that was holy, were Orphan’s table manners atrocious.

Orphan started eating her burger the way anyone else would eat corn on the cob: taking small bites in a row that got the mushroom stuff on the burger all over her face, and even in her hair.

Complicating this operation further was that Orphan would only use her working hand to eat the burger, so that no fast food crumbs or waste would sully the cast on her right arm, which had been signed by Batman himself.

That was another thing Barbara had noticed.  She knew that Orphan could at least comprehend the fact that Bruce Wayne was Batman, but Barbara hypothesized that Orphan was somewhat confused as to why Batman would take off his armor and be Bruce Wayne for the rest of the day.  She knew that Bruce was Batman, thus that Batman had signed her cast, and now that cast was a holy relic, not to be stained or disfigured under any circumstances whatsoever.

Orphan put the burger down, and picked up the shake.  Visibly intrigued by its weight, she took a sip, and the moment the chocolate hit her tongue, Orphan’s eyes lit up like Barbara imagined people at the 1893 World’s Fair did when they saw the lights of the White City.

“It’s good, isn’t it?” Barbara asked.  “Just be careful not to drink it too fast.  It’ll hurt.”

Orphan’s eyes narrowed at her.  Apparently taking this as a challenge, Orphan put her lips to the straw sticking out of the shake and started inhaling it…

...only to set the shake down a few seconds later, and put her hands to her temples with her eyes clenched shut.

Barbara laughed.

She couldn’t help herself.

* * *

**THE CLOCK TOWER**

Barbara pulled the Accord into the garage adjacent to the Clock Tower, and walked Orphan to the front door.

The stepped into the foyer of the Clock Tower, and the first thing she saw on the white tile floor was a large box addressed to her…

...with the WayneTech logo plastered on the front.

Barbara lugged the box under her arm, and she and Orphan stepped into the elevator.  Next stop: top floor.

She opened the door for Orphan, and set the box down next to the door frame after they both went through.  After she finished locking the door, Barbara turned to see what Orphan was doing.

Orphan was looking at the dry-erase board, upon which Barbara had jotted down a few notes for a… case that needed attention.

No…

No, Orphan wasn’t looking at that.

She was looking at the picture of Barbara and Dick taped next to the dry-erase board.

It was taken about a year and a half ago during a date that the two of them went on at Amusement Mile.  He was fresh off the latest break-up with Starfire, she was fresh off the break-up with Jason Bard, and both of them thought _“Why the hell not?”_ They’d been together ever since.

Orphan was staring at Dick.  Because of course she was.

Barbara was staring at the wheelchair she had been using.

The only time in the last three weeks that she hadn’t thought about the unique and thoroughly unpleasant situation in which she found herself had been the last couple of hours that she’d spent with Orphan.

Barbara wondered if Bruce had had that one planned out.

As much as Barbara liked to flip Bruce shit (privately, behind his back, and to his face) about the kind of person he was, she had to admit that he was crisis-oriented.  His heart seemed to grow the prerequisite three sizes when one of his flock was staring something down that seemed insurmountable. She’d have liked that he were amenable to his acquaintances’ emotional needs at any other time, but apparently that was something he was working on.

No, for the past couple of hours with Orphan, she hadn’t thought about how she felt as though she had been afflicted with something, and had been cursed to air her grievances about that affliction in a language no one else could decipher.  How on Earth was she supposed to articulate what she was feeling without looking and sounding as though she were ungrateful? As though she were wadding up and throwing away a quite literal magical solution to a problem that had caused her anguish and misery?  How was anyone supposed to get sad on her behalf? Or angry?

And she hadn’t thought about how she and Dick hadn’t been intimate in the three weeks since she had regained the use of her legs.  The sex life of Dick Grayson and Barbara Gordon had been as warm and as adventurous as one wherein one party was unable to feel anything from the waist down could possibly be.  But now that what had happened had happened, she couldn’t bring herself to go through with it. It was like driving to Six Flags Over Metropolis in a car that had a body in the trunk.  There was no other way she could describe it to herself. Yeah, the pressure had been off, what with the two of them living in different cities and his job hunt and all, but Dick had found a job, and the commute from Bludhaven to Gotham City was a short one.  This was going to come to a head eventually, and all she had was the hope that Dick would be as understanding as he had been.

That and… Well… Every year on her birthday on the occasions they'd been together, Dick gave her a lap dance.  And now, if she knew her boyfriend as well as she thought she did, he’d at least be hoping, if not expecting, her to return the favor.  And though she was a trained ballerina from a young age, Barbara Gordon did not have clue one on how to give a lap dance. Were there classes you had to take?  She imagined Googling _“Lap Dance Learning Annex Gotham City”_ on a cloned iPhone, before destroying it with a hammer just to be safe.

Or, rather, looking it up on Bing on her personal phone.  Her experience as Oracle taught her that not even the NSA looked at Bing searches.

Barbara folded her arms over her chest.  “This is, uh… I guess you could call it my lair.  This is where Oracle does her Oracle stuff, but, uhhh… I have a heavy bag up here if you want to kick something.  I also have a holo-room with a bunch of combat simulations, if you want to kick something with a face.”

Orphan looked over her shoulder and gave Barbara a stiff nod, before turning back to the photo.

“It’s tight, though,” Barbara said.  “If I had this kind of set-up when I was Batgirl, then I’d have been a hell of a lot better trained.”

Orphan turned around, and the look on her face was clear.

_Haven’t your lies debased us enough?  Not just us, but a weary nation?_

It seemed that Orphan just did not believe that Barbara Gordon had been the former Batgirl.

Orphan turned back to the photo, and Barbara noticed that she was standing by a desk.

_Did I leave it in there?_

Barbara quietly opened the drawer of the desk and found what she was looking for.

One of her old Batarangs, right there, next to a grapnel gun.

Barbara noiselessly lifted it from the drawer, hefted it in her hand, and transferred it to her fingers.

She was aiming for the wall a good eighteen inches away from Orphan’s head.  Close enough to make her point, but far enough away that there was no danger of catastrophe.

Barbara threw the Batarang.  Some things were like riding a bike, and she could picture it sailing toward the blank expanse of wall near Orphan…

...only for Orphan to whirl around and catch it between the thumb and forefinger of her left hand.

Seeing Orphan’s ungodly speed on a dinky little smartphone was one thing, but seeing it in person was breathtaking.  Literally. Barbara had to take in a ragged inhale before she was able to say _“Whoa!”_

And Orphan, for her part, was impressed as well.  Not by anything Barbara had done, but with what she held in her hand.  An actual, real Batarang.

Orphan looked from the object in her hand to Barbara with a smile of stunned surprise.

And if Barbara didn’t know that Orphan finally believed the fact that she was the former Batgirl, then she would when Orphan had done to her what she had done to Batman the night prior.

Orphan genuflected.

Barbara Gordon allowed herself one hot second to feel like Elvis, before asking Orphan “Oh, will you _knock that shit off?”_

* * *

They spent the rest of the day, until about ten-thirty PM, just watching TV in the bedroom one floor down that Orphan picked out for herself.  Switching from channel to channel until they found a movie on one of the upper channels. It took a while for Barbara to spot the film: It was _Starship Troopers._

They had just gotten to the channel when one of the giant alien bugs impaled that female soldier with the frizzy red hair, and Orphan actually squirmed in her seat.

_She can’t read and she can’t talk, Barbara.  This might be her first movie._

“You know it’s not real, right?” Barbara asked.

Orphan blinked at her.

“Yeah,” Barbara said.  “They do all that with computers.  That actress is very much alive, and… and I’m sure she’s talented.  This is the only thing I’ve seen her in.”

Orphan seemed to ponder this for a moment, then nodded, and turned her eyes back to the TV.

At ten-thirty, Orphan let off a deep yawn.

“You shower today?”

Orphan nodded.

“Alright,” Barbara said.  “I think it might be time for you to go to bed.  You look like you’re about to crash. Every bedroom on this floor has a bathroom, so go ahead and pick whichever one you want.  Tomorrow… We’ll buy toothpaste, ‘cause I forgot about that. And we’ll get you some more clothes.”

Orphan’s thick black eyebrows made a mad dash to the middle of her forehead.  She seemed to be terrified by this proposition.

“I know,” Barbara said, “but it needs to be done.  You walk the streets of Batman’s city, you gotta look dope.  Them’s the rules.”

Orphan’s inquisitive gaze asked if them, indeed, was the rules.

Barbara got off the bed, and absently patted Orphan on the back.  “Sleep tight.”

And out the door she walked.

She took the elevator up a floor, and as soon as she arrived, she made a beeline to the door at which she had left the WayneTech box that had been left there that afternoon.

Barbara put her hands on her hips, and regarded the box for a spell, before she closed her eyes…

* * *

**SABERHAGEN MEAT PACKING PLANT - FIVE YEARS AGO**

Batman took the rear entrance.

Robin took the side.

And Batgirl… took the sewer.

She had memorized the sewer layout for this part of the city beforehand, and saw that there was a grate that opened up in the center of the Saberhagen Meat Packing Plant.

And once she emerged through the floor, she knew why.

Batgirl emerged in a refrigeration unit, and her breath came out of her mouth in a thick fog.

Hung on hooks from the ceiling, casting shadows on the white tile walls, were dead bodies. Twelve in all, eight men and four women.

All naked.

All sliced up the middle like pig carcasses in a slaughterhouse.

All headless.

If there was one thing Batgirl took solace in upon finding this sight, it was that these victims felt little to no pain before their untimely demises.  The MO of Dollhouse (and her father Dollmaker before her) was that the victims were sedated and tranquilized before they got down to their vile and ungodly version of business.  This was because, though they liked seeing pain, struggle and screaming would gravely imperil the organs during surgery. The organs were extracted, and sold on the black market.  Then, in cases of non-lethal surgery, the victims’ skulls were crushed by a sledgehammer.

The remains were then frozen.

 _Remains,_ Batgirl thought.   _Don’t you mean_ “leftovers?”

Batgirl looked at where she had her hands, and noticed the brown stain around the grate that spread outward.

_This grate is where all the blood drains._

_Note to self: Burn these gloves._

Batgirl brought herself up to the floor, took a deep breath, and softly left the room.

There were no light on in the cavernous hall outside.

No.

No, that wasn’t right.

There was a tiny flicker to her left.  From beneath the last door down this hallway on the right.

Batgirl’s footfalls were silent when she advanced.  She turned the doorknob slowly, quietly, and opened it.

This small room was lit solely by candlelight.  It appeared to be an employee break room. When the plant shut down, they hadn’t even bothered removing the tables.  Or the stove. Or the fridge.

Atop one of the tables was a dead body.  One of the headless ones from the refrigerator unit from which she had emerged inside the building.  The body showed signs of having thawed out.

The body, a man, had a thick trail of blood leading from the enormous wound in his abdominal cavity to the stove that the table was situated next to.

Or rather, from the body to the frying pan on the stove.

As she tried to reckon with the picture that painted, she caught a deep, sweet tang upon the air.  The meat that had been consumed form that poor soul on the table had been cooked recently, which--

“I just wanted something to drink.”

Batgirl tensed, and turned immediately.

The long shadows from the candles made Dollhouse seem taller than she actually was.  Batgirl was an intimidating five-eleven, and the ears on her Bat-Cowl made her seem taller, but Dollhouse, who must have been five-seven, seemed as tall as an oak tree.

Dollhouse had had a doll mask grafted to her face, through which her blue eyes peered.  Her blonde hair came down to her shoulders in greasy strands. She was wearing a white nurse’s costume (not “uniform,” as nurses wore scrubs these days), with flecks and drops of dried blood staining the front.

In one hand she held a plate that contained a knife, a fork, and a hot cutlet of… meat.

In the other she held a can of Mountain Dew.

The only part of Dollhouse’s face that wasn’t covered by the mask, save for her eyes, was the square cutout that left her mouth exposed.

Her lips were stained red.  And her breath, complete with the stench of dead flesh, wafted into Batgirl’s nostrils.

“You’re not supposed to be here,” Dollhouse said.  Her voice was high and phlegmy

Batgirl’s own tongue screamed at her to say something clever.  Her muscles cried out to be put to use against the side of this demon’s face.  But she was cursed with fear. Forsaken with silence. Abashed with stillness.

“You are very pretty,” Dollhouse said.  “But to say that you are prettier than I would make me the… most _contemptible_ sort of liar.”

Without taking her eyes off of Batgirl, Dollhouse set her human meat and her soda on the table, before straightening back up.

“Me,” Dollhouse said.  “My daddy. His daddy before him.  We’ve all had most delicacies of life between our teeth at one time or another.  Though I have to say… Ain’t never had _bat_ before.”

Even if Batgirl had scouted what had happened next, there was still no way she could have dodged it.  In a flash, Dollhouse produced a butcher knife from the belt of her nurse’s outfit and slashed at Batgirl’s face, cutting her open across the cheek, and with a second strike, cut along a plate of her armor at the hip bone so hard that it sent up sparks.

Batgirl, out of reflex more than anything else, drove a fist in the side of Dollhouse’s head as she cried out.  It was hard enough to knock Dollhouse to the linoleum in a heap.

Her training told her to stomp on the side of her head and subdue her.

And yet…

Barbara Gordon had eidetic memory.  Her recall was so perfect that, in the right frame of mind, she could relive the past as though it was still happening.

So it was hard to forget the monster under the bed.

When she was little, she was terrified, as most children are, of the monster under her bed.  The one that ate little kids like her. And after enough assurances, and entreaties, and lectures from her father, she eventually came to terms with the fact that no, there was no monster under her bed.

But with Dollhouse at her feet, the daughter and granddaughter of murderers, an insane cannibal who killed scores of people, Barbara Gordon knew that the monster under the bed was very much real.

Batgirl knew she had the training to take her down.

But Batgirl ran away anyway.

She burst through the break room door, her running footsteps echoing in the massive hall.

Batgirl chanced a glance over her shoulder.

Dollhouse was running after her…

...and was immediately stopped by Batman dropping from the ceiling.

Batgirl stopped running and turned the rest of the way around.

She heard Dollhouse stir and groan, and then a painful sounding thud.

It seemed that Batman did what Batgirl should have done in the first place, and stomped Dollhouse into unconsciousness.

Batman turned around, and even though the hall was dark, Batgirl could feel herself glowing in the dark with embarrassment and shame.

After a moment of silence, Batman finally said:

“I can’t blame you.  This is terrible.”

Then, he turned around, to bind Dollhouse’s wrists with handcuffs.

Batman didn’t blame her for running away form the scary monster.

So… why did Batgirl feel like that was the worst thing that happened tonight?

* * *

**THE CLOCK TOWER - NOW**

Barbara opened her eyes.

Her stomach gurgled.

She knew she shouldn’t have had that rare steak for lunch.

When The Undying attacked three weeks ago, the first stage in his plan involved freeing all of the inmates from Blackgate Penitentiary, and all of the patients from Arkham Asylum.

And while they eventually got most of the patients back into Arkham, they didn’t get _all_ of them.

Dollhouse was one of the ones who decided to extend their vacation time.

Barbara knelt down and opened the WayneTech box.

Atop the pile was a pair of unbreakable carbon fiber monofilament fighting sticks called _tonfa._  They were about fifteen inches long, with a perpendicular handle a third of the way down the length of each.  They were light-weight and impactful, and could be twirled by the handle for extra momentum during a strike.

_Like escrima sticks, but with style.  SUCK IT, NIGHTWING!_

They were lying there next to a spare grapnel gun.  She took them out of the box and set them on the floor.  All that was left in the box were the clothes.

Barbara stripped down to her skivvies and socks, and started getting dressed in the remaining contents of the box.

Black leather pants: A must for someone who planned on riding a motorcycle.  They had some bag to them, though, they weren’t skin-tight, for which Barbara was grateful.  She didn’t know how Selina got around as Catwoman without separate wedgies in both the back and the front.

Black standard issue combat boots.

A black turtleneck.

A gray kevlar chest guard with compartments in the side of each of its three overlapping plates that could store gadgets.  It went from her collarbone all the way down to her belt line. Utility belts were fine and dandy, but they were easy to take off.  This chest guard came with shoulder and waist straps that were so snug that they effectively bound her chest. Which Barbara saw as a positive.  She was five-eleven, so any gender confusion kept people further away from her secret identity.

A black leather trench coat.

Now all that was left was the goodies.

She started with the gloves.  They were spider silk, making them light and durable.  They were veined with flexible circuitry and holographic imagers.

There were two smooth, off-color bands near the wrists.

“Right,” Barbara said to herself.  “Lucius told me about these.”

She ran her fingers across the bands, and they started lightly glowing blue.

Barbara held out her hands… and clapped.

There was no sound.

Barbara giggled.  She now had, for lack of a better term, “Hand Silencers.”  Great for typing in a dangerous location.

Or punching people in the face, she thought.

But then there was the next part.  The bands around her wrists were glowing a little bit more vividly now.

She walked over to her heavy bag hanging from the ceiling.  She held out her hands, and touched the two bands on her wrists together.

_Foom…_

It was quiet, and it was weak, but it made the heavy bag slightly rock back and forth.

The bands on the wrists of her gloves not only silenced the movements of her hands, but collected that excess energy.  Once the bands made contact with each other, that excess energy was released in a concussive blast. Just clapping her hands once wasn’t a lot, but if she got into a fist fight with five goons, she could silently beat the crap out of four of them, touch her wrists together, and knock the fifth one out of their shoes.

The possibilities made Barbara giddy.  Her thought was so joyous, so raucous, that it demanded to be let from her mouth.

“I can _Hadouken_ now,” she said.

But that wasn’t all.

She did what she remembered Lucius telling her to do.  The clapped her hands and then laid them flat, palms up, like a blackjack dealer leaving the table.

A holographic keyboard and a rectangle that acted as a monitor appeared above her hands.

She turned her hands over, and the keyboard dropped to meet her fingers.

“Wow,” Barbara said.

And the homepage appeared to be DuckDuckGo.

_Lucius, you know me so well._

All she had to clench her fists twice, and the keyboard and monitor disappeared.

The gloves shared both memories and processing power with the server towers downstairs.  All the power of her equipment, available on the go, anywhere on Earth.

All that was left now… was the mask.

It was the same kind of spider silk as the gloves, and also veined with holographic imagers.

She took off her glasses, and piled her head and her red ponytail into the mask.

The mask was fitted specifically for the front of her face.  He nose fit snugly, but comfortably, and the tinted eye-lenses were in the same prescription as her glasses.

There was a small silver notch on the mask that was located underneath the right side of her jaw next to her ear.

She pressed it.

Barbara designed a logo for herself; green and somewhat reminiscent of an African tribal mask.  High cheekbones, narrow eyes, sensuous lips, and a pronounced crown to the skull in an attempt to portray astonishing brainpower.

And a three-dimensional holographic rendition of that mask wrapped itself around her head.

Barbara blinked one eye, and then the other.  Then she raised her eyebrows.

And the green holographic mask did the same thing.

She opened her mouth to speak, and as she did, not only did the lips of the mask move, but her voice came out low and strange, thanks to the voice modulator built into the front.

“Niiiiiiice,” Oracle said.

She held her hand in front of her face, and smiled.  Despite the fact that the holographic mask above the spider silk mask was made of holographic hard light, it gave off no light itself.  So she wouldn’t give herself away by sneaking around.

She tapped the thumb and pinkie of her left hand together, and a dial appeared around her hand in a semicircle, with a knob on the right.

This was supposed to control the holographic mask’s opacity.

She turned the dial all the way to the left, and the holographic mask camouflaged itself to her surroundings.  It was like she didn’t have a head. _Perfect_ for reconnaissance, and looking around corners.

Oracle turned the dial back, the mask’s opacity was at full, and both versions of her face grinned.

Dollhouse was out there right now.

And Oracle knew where she was.

She could use the motorcycle…

 _...or_ she could use her brand new grapnel gun to get around.

And tonight seemed so lovely, after all.

* * *

**WHISTLING DAWN RETIREMENT HOME**

Oracle knew that Dollhouse’s predilections required an easy place to set up shop.  A place that had built in medical, refrigeration, and storage facilities. She was a creature of habit, and all her previous bases of operation had been confined to one small section of the mainland, from as far north as Old Industrial, to as far south as The Bowery.

Matilda “Dollhouse” Mathis could do with two of the three, but the only place that could pull off the hat trick was Whistling Dawn Retirement Home (now defunct).

It was weird to Oracle that an old folks home, of all things, could actually close.  It seemed as bad as a hospital or a school going under. But she did her research, and Whistling Dawn cratered due to a mixture of embezzlement and lawsuits from the families of the residents alleging abuse and theft.

As she grappled from rooftop to rooftop across the East End, Oracle wondered where all the old folks went after the old folks home shut down.

Under cover of night, farther away from the dingy light pollution of the East End than she thought possible without heading into the suburbs, the Whistling Dawn Retirement Home sat dark.

The only thing that separated it from any other abandoned building this close to the Bowery was the two henchmen outside the front entrance.

Oracle had dropped to street level three blocks away, and she used her mask’s thermal imaging capabilities to spot them.

She went into her own version of stealth mode around the corner of the two story structure from where the two goons were standing.  There was a tall skinny one and a short fat one.

The short fat one was taking a leak into the small ditch where Oracle imagined the planters for shrubs had been.

“Hey,” the tall skinny one said.  “You ever have moral qualms about the shit we do?”

“It’s hard for me to go with people talking,” the short fat one said while he was tending to his business.

A short lull as Oracle touched the Hand Silencers on her gloves.

_Time to go to work._

As she snuck toward them, trying to stay behind them so they didn’t see her, the tall skinny one started talking again.

“‘Cause… y’know… we’re working for a cannibal right now.”

The short fat one, who Oracle must have sworn had drunk one of the sixty-four ounce Big Gulps from 7-11 a couple of hours prior to this conversation, said “Beats The Joker.  I used to hench for him.”

“The Joker didn’t eat people.”

“I was allergic to clown makeup,” the short fat one said.  “Rash all over my face. Looked like pizza with those little pepperoni _cubes_ on it instead of the slices?  Then that fucker made me wear it all the time.”

“Jesus…”

End of sentence, thought Oracle, and grabbed one of her tonfa from a loop on the back of her leather duster.

She paintbrushed the back of his head with two quick, utterly silent strokes, and grabbed him before he fell.  There was no sound other than the short fat one trying to get the last of his Big Gulp out.

The short fat one zipped himself as he said “Joker giving a shit about whether all his henchmen matched kinda came and went.  But me? I always had to wear the--”

Oracle drove the tonfa into his head just behind the ear.  He fell forward, but Oracle caught him, and gingerly brought him back to the cracked pavement.  He may have been working for a cannibal, but sending this poor guy headlong and unconscious into a puddle of his own piss was an indignity she didn’t feel like visiting upon him.

Now that these two were taken care of, Oracle thought it best to enter the building via roof access.

Once she had grapneled to the roof, Oracle instantly saw the exit door.  No keypad. She fished a lockpick and a torque wrench out of one of the side compartments of her chest guard.

The classics never go out of style.

Barbara Gordon was not Selina Kyle, who could apparently open a lock just by flirting with it, so it took Oracle some time to get it open.

Once it was unlocked, she brought the opacity of her holographic mask down to half, and quietly padded down to the second floor.  She brought up the thermal imaging up on the lenses of her mask, but once she saw the light source, she switched it back off again.

She was just outside an open area in the middle of the floor that must have been a rec center, before Whistling Dawn went tits up and they moved out the pool tables and checkerboards.  It was lit solely by battery powered lanterns that ran for eight bucks at any sporting good store.

There was one chair in the middle a about five or six on the side, decorated by wadded up fats food bags and wrappers.

The person in that middle chair was tied to it, quietly weeping.  His long scraggly beard and dirty face said _“homeless.”_  Dollhouse had taken to targeting transients the last time she was active.

And he was surrounded by henchmen.

Oracle counted eight.

“Will someone shut that asshole up?” One of the henchmen asked  He was in a pair of jeans and a plain white T. He looked like one of John Travolta’s buddies from _Grease,_ and oracle wondered if there was a pompadour phase among the kids today that she’d missed.

One of the other henchmen said “The guy’s crying.  How are we supposed to--”

The greaser clubbed the homeless man on the right side of the head.  His quiet weeping became loud blubbering.

“Y’know,” the other henchman said, “I don’t think beating on this guy is gonna get him to quiet down.”

The greaser pulled a gun out of the back of the waistband of his jeans, and pointed it at the homeless man.

That shut him up.

“Look, you bum,” the greaser said.  “All Dollhouse wants is a kidney. Just the one.  We got a bathtub of ice waiting for you. Had to go down to the Circle K and buy bags of the shit myself.  Think I’d go through all that trouble if you were just gonna fuckin’ _die?_  You keep bawling like a bitch, _then_ you’re gonna fuckin’ die.”

The homeless man was silent.  The greaser put the gun back in his pants like the dipshit Oracle thought he apparently was.

“Relax,” he said.  “Chill out, we’ll put you under, and when you wake up, you’ll be back to giving squeeze-jobs for crack in no t--”

**CRASH!**

_Something_ shattered the window coming in.  It was hanging from a rope. The henchmen covered their faces to protect themselves from the flying glass.

No.  It was _someone._

Oracle’s eyes had to adjust, but she could see their diminutive frame.  Their face was bathed in shadow by the hoodie they were wearing.

And she could see the cast on their right arm.

Oracle gasped.

_“Orphan?”_

The eight henchmen in the room paid no attention to Oracle.  Their eyes were affixed on Orphan.

Oracle made a mad dash to the main room.  It was eight fully grown men, some with guns, against one girl with a broken arm.  She didn’t know how badly that wo--

**WHAM!**

Oracle almost skidded to a stop.

It was one thing to watch what Orphan could do on a surveillance feed with no sound.  It was quite a different thing to see what she could do when they were in the same room and her strikes hit so hard they sounded like gunshots.

The greaser was dumb enough to advance on her, and Orphan back fisted him like she was swatting a particularly slow and none-too-bright fly.  The asshole stood up straight like he’d been given an ultimatum on his posture from the Almighty Himself, before he collapsed to the white linoleum like a tumbling Jenga tower.  The report from her fist was so loud that the other seven immediately, though momentarily, backed off and recoiled.

Oracle continued her dash, taking the two tonfa out of the loop on the back of her coat.

As Orphan delivered a stunning flying kick from a standing position to the sternum of one of the other henchmen, Oracle decided to pick a fight with the four that made up the back row.

Oracle put her shoulders into the silent blows from her tonfa, the hand silencers absorbing the sound and the energy.

She’d put down two of them before the other two got wise.  Oracle rammed the tonfa into the gut of the one on the right.  He doubled over, perfect for a knee to the forehead that would lay him out.

Amid the thunderclaps of Orphan’s flying fists and feet, Oracle put her ballet training to use, and brought the last remaining henchman to his knees by planting a high kick right on the tip of the chin.  He tried to get to his feet, but he dropped to his knees again. The lights were on with this poor bastard, but nobody was home. He curled up onto the floor in a mixture of embarrassment and encroaching unconsciousness.

Oracle heard crunching wood.  She looked up to see Orphan literally breaking the arms of the chair to which the homeless man was bound.  Once he was free, two words fell out of Orphan’s mouth in a bass rumble.

“Go… Safe...”

The homeless man did not need to be told twice.  He ran past Oracle to the stairwell.

With all of the henchmen put cold, Oracle and Orphan made eye contact, and walked toward each other.

Orphan waved.  She apparently seemed to know that Barbara Gordon was under the mask.

“Why are you here?” Oracle asked.

Orphan pointed at her.

“You followed me?  How?”

Orphan pulled a grapnel gun out of the pocket of her hoodie.

“And where did you get that?”

Orphan reached into the other pocket of her hoodie, and pulled out the Batarang that Barbara had thrown at the wall that afternoon.  It had been in the same drawer with that grapnel gun.

_At least she’s observant._

“Look,” Oracle said.  “You had _no_ right to…”

Orphan’s eyes went wide at something she saw behind Oracle.  She immediately shoved Oracle out of the way, and used a nearby chair as a jumping off point.

**BLAM!**

As Oracle fell, she saw a bullet rip through Orphan’s midsection.  A thin rope of blood flew from her back.

Oracle landed on her ass in a panic, as Orphan’s head banged off the linoleum.  She looked into the dark hallway.

Dollhouse was standing there, her nurse’s uniform bloodier than ever.  She was holding before her a nine millimeter pistol.

“That little ragamuffin cost me forty-five thousand dollars and a week’s worth of meals,” Dollhouse said.

Either Oracle triggered her mask’s infrared sensors, or her vision clouded over red in an unfathomable rage.  One of the two.

Oracle got to her feet and, in a stark contrast to the similar situation five years ago, ran _towards_ the monster from under the bed that ate people.

Taking a cue from Orphan, she used the chair in front of her as a jumping-off point.

What happened next occurred in slow-motion.

As Dollhouse raised her nine, taking a bead on her, Oracle slammed the bands on the wrists of her gloves together.

The absorbed energy of silently dispatching four people erupted from her hands in a mighty and staggering **_FOOOOOM!_ **

Dollhouse’s gun flew from her hand, and she flew into the wall behind her so hard that she left a crater in the plaster.

The cannibal dropped to the floor as Oracle made landfall.  Dollhouse reached for the gun, but Oracle kicked it out of reach.  She straddled her and started raining brutal savage rights into the square opening in the mask that exposed Dollhouse’s mouth.

Oracle, in the moment, couldn’t tell how long this went on.  Or how many variations of the sworn oath beginning with the letter F came spittle-flecked out of her mouth.

She only stopped when a hand, with a grip the likes of which Oracle had never felt before, literally lifted her up off the prone supervillain and slammed her against the wall.

It was Orphan.  She had her right hand over her gunshot wound (with blood getting all over her cast), but other than that, she didn’t seem to be all that put out by the fact that a bullet had both left and entered her body.

No, Orphan was disturbed by something else entirely.

“Don’t… Kill.”

This snapped Oracle to.  “I… I wasn’t…”

Orphan slammed Oracle’s arm against the wall again.  Her eyes were resolute, and her voice angry.

 _“Never…_ Kill.”

“I wasn’t gonna kill her,” Oracle said.  “It’s just… Jesus, are you alright?”

Orphan looked down at her gunshot wound, back at Oracle, and just shrugged.

“Well aren’t you just Little Miss Badass?”

Orphan nodded.

Oracle looked back down at the unconscious and bloodied Dollhouse.

It occurred to her that Batgirl had to fail in order for Oracle to succeed.  And now that a great bit of her past's unfinished business had now been resolved, she knew that she had to say something awesome and clever to mark the occasion.  But all Oracle could come up with was:

"Hadouken, bitch."

Orphan looked at her with confusion.

“I’ll tell you later,” Oracle said, and she took off her mask.  She opened her hand and tapped the palm of her glove three times.  A holographic number pad appeared.

“I’m gonna call the cops to pick the garbage up,” Barbara said, “but first I’m getting us out of here.”

Instead of punching in a number, Barbara spoke into the number pad.

“Call Helena,” she said.

* * *

**EXIT 29 REST STOP**

Helena Bertinelli was born into a mafia family.  At age eight, her mother, father, and two brothers were murdered right in front of her by a rival organization.  Rather than be entered into the Gotham City Foster System, her uncle Salvatore from the Old Country brought her to Sicily.  From age eight to the age of twenty-one, she learned martial arts and marksmanship.

She came back as Huntress, cutting a bloody swath through the Gotham underworld until she was stopped (as most bad things are stopped in this city) by Batman.

He recognized her skills and the righteousness which she apparently sought, so he offered her something: sponsorship for a seat in the Justice League.  Her propensity for lethal force, however, resulted in her resignation.

She operated at a periphery to Batman in Gotham City, eventually joining Barbara “Oracle” Gordon and Dinah “Black Canary” Lance in the group known as the Birds of Prey.

In spite of the fact that she had killed, in spite of the fact that she held no reservations toward killing in the future, and despite the fact that she had slept with Dick Grayson during lulls in his relationships with both Barbara and Starfire, Barbara and Helena considered themselves close friends.

Most of the time.

Helena pulled up to the Whistling Dawn parking lot in her Aston Martin before the cops came to pick up Dollhouse and her goons.  Barbara rode shotgun, and Orphan rode in the back on a pile of towels so she didn’t get blood everywhere.

Miss Bertinelli had a look on her face that told Barbara that she had been in the middle of something either very important or very fun when she had been called upon.

The pulled into the rest stop on Exit 29, and Barbara made sure that all the surveillance feeds were cut.  They had to act fast. The Kane County Sheriff’s Department would send a cruiser down once they noticed the feed cut out.

They all filed out of the Aston Martin, and made their way to the women’s restroom, Helena at the forefront with a first aid kit under her arm.  The first words Helena said were to Orphan.

“You.  Shirt. Off.”

Orphan sat down on one of the toilets in one of the stalls, and peeled off her bloody hoodie and her even bloodier sweatshirt.

Helena rolled enough of the stall’s toilet paper onto the floor, so she could successfully tend to patching up Orphan while keeping the knees of her jeans free from the scum that accumulates on the restroom floor of a rest stop.  Helena pulled her long black hair into a ponytail so she could work, but before she did she levelled her brown eyes on Barbara behind her.

“You couldn’t call Alfred for this?” Helena asked.

“I didn’t want his particular brand of stink-eye,” Barbara said.  “Not tonight.”

Helena sighed, and opened her kit.

Barbara looked at Orphan sitting there with no shirt on, and noticed three things.

The first was that Bruce’s estimation of the scar tissue on Orphan’s body was not an exaggeration.  To Barbara, her upper torso looked like a piece of chewed Juicy Fruit gum.

The second was that, even under the scar tissue and despite the clear evidence of malnutrition, Orphan’s lean frame was packed with well-defined muscle.  It was like she wasn’t only built to be dangerous, but rather dangerous and unassuming.

The third, and the one that made Barbara Gordon flush with second-hand embarrassment, was the bra that Orphan was wearing.  It was a genuinely hideous aqua, it was too small for her, it was stained, it had holes in the fabric on the side… and it _reeked to high heaven._

 _Of course Bruce and Alfred wouldn’t think to buy the homeless girl a bra,_ Barbara thought.   _Why would they?  It’s one more Goddamn thing I have to do tomorrow._

“Yo,” Helena said to Orphan.  “Squirt.”

Orphan looked at her.

“Dinah is the nice one,” Helena said.  “Babs is the nicer one. Me? I’m not nice at all.  You get blood in that car, I will dropkick you down a flight of stairs.”

“Don’t threaten her,” Barbara said.

“Why?” Helena asked.  “You feeling strong for the little gremlin, here?  You feeling God in this Chili's tonight?”

“No,” Barbara said, “because she can remove all four years of college from your head with just one punch.”

Helena turned back to look at Barbara with muted disbelief.

“I’m serious,” Barbara said.  “I have video proof of her completely wrecking twenty people in a stand up last night all on her lonesome.  You put Orphan in a time machine, and she will beat the German armies of both World Wars all by herself.  She... Will hurt... Your feelings.

Helena looked back at Orphan, and Orphan raised her eyebrows, as though to confirm the assessment.

“Well, we’ll just have to test that theory one day, won’t we?” Helena asked.

“You keep bitching,” Barbara said, “and we’ll test that theory tonight.”

Helena made a face over her shoulder, and got back to work.

Barbara examined Orphan’s face as Helena worked.  The young lady was just staring off into space, as though she were getting her nails done, and not as though as stranger was sewing up an entry and an exit wound.

Helena was halfway done before she spoke again.

“What the fuck is up with your _bra_ , Squirt?  My nose is right next to it, and it smells like how sadness feels.  You find it in a dumpster or something?”

“Yes,” Orphan said in her low bass croak.

Helena actually seemed surprised by this.  She looked back at Barbara before she looked back at Orphan again.

“Well, at least you’re honest,” Helena said.  Then she got back to work.

Helena had applied the bandage to the exit wound, and was about to apply it to the entry wound, when she used a finger to beckon Barbara to look over her shoulder.

“This… is a flesh wound,” Helena said.

“I find that hard to believe.”

“It’s true,” Helena said.  “No arteries, no veins, no organs.  It looks a hell of a lot worse than it is.”

“Then it’s a miracle.”

Helena shook her head.  “That’s just it. No it isn’t.”

She pointed a finger to Orphan’s entry wound.  “See that discoloration around the wound?”

“Yeah.”

“That’s scar tissue,” Helena said.  “She’s been shot here before. Not just in the general vicinity.  The _exact same spot._  Do I need to tell you how rare and impossible that is?”

“No,” Barbara said.  “No you don’t.”

The reality slowly set in on Barbara.  Orphan pushed her out of the way of Dollhouse’s bullet.  Not only that, but she knew exactly where her body needed to be in order to take that bullet with as little damage to herself as humanly possible.  She could have shoved Oracle out of the way and went in the opposite direction. but that ran the risk of hesitation, or Dollhouse shifting the gun at the last instant.

Barbara didn’t want to ask the question.

Helena did it for her.  She looked Orphan in the eye and asked:

“What _are_ you?”

* * *

**THE CLOCK TOWER**

Before they left the rest stop, while they were still sitting in the Aston Martin, Barbara showed Helena a copy of the warehouse surveillance feed from the night before on her phone.

She watched it in silence until the part where Orphan dodged the bullet after it left the chamber, at which point Helena groaned _“Daaaaaaaaamn.”_

She handed the phone back to Barbara, and turned around in the driver’s seat to look at Orphan.

“Hey,” Helena said.  “I’m sorry. I take back every last bad thing I said about you.  She said you were good, I didn’t know you worked miracles. After seeing what you did in that warehouse last night, I am the _president_ of your fan club.”

“Yeah,” said Barbara.  “She has a stricter no-kill rule than Batman, and I didn’t even think that was possible.”

Helena looked at Barbara, and then back to Oracle.  “Okay, I am the _vice-treasurer_ of your fan club.”

They barely spoke on their way back to the Clock Tower.  The Aston Martin pulled up in front, and the three women got out.  Barbara got her keys out of the back pocket of her leather pants, gave them to Orphan, and put her hands on Orphan’s shoulders.

“Leave the doors unlocked so I can come up in a little bit.  I _implore_ you to throw that funky-ass bra in the garbage, and go to bed.  We’ll talk more in the morning.”

Orphan turned and walked into the ground floor entrance of the Clock Tower.  Barbara walked back over to the Aston Martin, where Helena was leaning against the driver’s side door.  Her white and gray t-shirt clashed against her dark skin beneath the sodium glow of the streetlight above them.

Helena called out to Orphan.  "Catch ya 'round, Stinky-Tits!"

Orphan, without turning, raised her left fist over her left shoulder, and flipped Helena the bird.

Helena smiled at Barbara when she got up to her.  "We're friends."

“She saved my life,” Barbara said.  “I shouldn’t be pissed at her, but I am soooo pissed at her.”

“Why?” Helena asked.  “If you didn’t listen to Batman when he told you to stop being a superhero, why in the hell should she listen to you when you tear her a new one when she’s more capable of taking care of herself than you were at that age?”

“If I wanted stuff that made sense coming out of your mouth, I would have specifically asked for it.”

Helena sighed.  “I just want to know where I can find my own homeless teenage bodyguard who just tanks gunshots in non-vital areas without complaint.  Did you have to pay extra for the one that sounds like Michael Madsen with laryngitis when she speaks?”

Barbara just sighed.

The thing about Helena, disagreeable as she had a habit of being, was that for the past three weeks, she hadn’t broached the subject of her mobility.  Not once.

_I love you, you nasty little bitch..._

“Wanna hear something funny?” Helena asked.

“Sure.”

Helena smiled.  “There’s another Batgirl in Gotham City right now.”

Barbara glared at Helena.  “What?”

“Yeah.”

“How come I didn’t hear about this?”

“Because it’s the kind of gossip people whisper right now,” Helena said, “not the kind of gossip people have started typing yet.”

“Who is it?”

“Damned if I know,” Helena said.  “I just heard she was ginger and sucked at fighting, and I automatically assumed it was you.  But I guess that new Oracle outfit you were wearing tonight kinda takes you out of the running, doesn’t it?

* * *

Barbara made it to the relative quietude of the top floor.  She dropped her trench coat, gloves, and mask on the couch by the far wall.  She took her glasses off the end table next to the pile of her civilian clothes, and put them on.

_“Shit…”_

She fished her phone out of the trench coat, and checked for missed calls.

In the ride from the rest stop to the Clock Tower, she missed two calls from Bruce.

She called him.

“Barbara?” Bruce asked over the line.

“I’m here.  You need something?”

“Yes… First, did you look at those files I sent you?”

“For the new Birds?  No, not yet.”

“I hear over the police band,” Bruce said, “that Dollhouse has been taken into custody.  Am I correct in assuming you had something to do with that?”

Barbara sighed.  “You would.”

“And Orphan?”

“Her too.”

There was a pause on the other end of the line, before Bruce finally said:

“I’m… proud of you.”

The Barbara Gordon of five years ago would have killed for Batman to say that to her.  The Barbara Gordon of now, however…

“Bruce,” Barbara said, “if you were being controlled by Starro, you’d tell me, right?”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Can we Skype?  Can we do that so I can see you blink twice if you need help?”

Bruce sighed.  “I’m trying do to the difficult and… unfamiliar parts of my recovery first.”

“You do realize that recovery in mental health is a continuous process that takes the rest of your life, and not something where you can do the hard parts first and then coast?”

“I know,” Bruce said, “but I still need a plan.”

Barbara couldn’t help but start giggling.

“I take it back,” Barbara said.  “There’s the Bruce Wayne I know.”

“Are you done?”

“No,” Barbara said, “I will never be done.”

“So you don’t want to know what I found out about Orphan?”

That got her attention.  “What did you find out?”

“Not everything,” Bruce said.  “But a lot…”

* * *

_It would take a law enforcement agency weeks to find out all of the information I’m about to tell you._

_As Batman, I did it in one night._

_To begin with, Orphan’s real name is Cassandra Cain._

_She left a hair in the passenger’s seat of the Batmobile, which I ran for DNA on the Batcomputer.  I haven’t updated it in three years, and I know your equipment’s stronger at the moment, but given what’s happened since the city’s entanglement with The Undying, I didn’t want to bother you._

_The hair came up with a match for a man named David Cain, who was wound tight with the League of Assassins.  There had been a schism between Cain and the League when he came to Gotham City eight years ago, when he had cut a swath through League members._

_Talia al Ghul included._

_The rumor at the time, which I placed little stock in, was that David was in Gotham looking for his daughter._

_I cross-referenced known League associates in the past twenty years with the members being held at Blackgate at the moment, after Talia brought them with her to aid The Undying and Black Manta in their taking of the city._

_I found a match._

_A thirty-eight year old woman from South Korea named Park Kyung-ah, who had been taken in by the League as a teenager, and was a senior member of Talia’s honor guard, had been apprehended by The Atom the day that The Undying and Black Manta were taken into custody.  And being as it’s been three weeks, and no rescue effort by the League of Assassins in general, or Talia al Ghul in particular had been mounted, Miss Park was most eager to speak with me._

_There had been a rumor some seventeen years ago that David Cain had conceived a daughter, and had begun training her to be, in his words, “One who is All:” a perfect bodyguard for Ra’s al Ghul._

_She was trained--quite literally from birth--to be the consummate killing machine.  She was raised in an environment almost entirely bereft of verbal or written stimulus.  She was not taught to talk or read. She was taught every form of martial arts known to man._

_In order to educate Cassandra on the human body, the location of nerve clusters, pressure points, veins, arteries, organs, David would quite literally murder people in front of her._

_Not only that, but she was taught to endure grievous amounts of pain.  Miss Park tells me that one of the things David liked to do to his daughter was shoot her in a non-vital part of her body, and if she cried out, if she even so much as flinched, he would shoot her in the same spot again._

_This went on for the first nine years of her life, during which time Cassandra showed prodigious and devastating talent, so much so that she could predict the movements of her opponent, or group of opponents, before even they could.  Body language is her first, and can divine a person’s intent from the slightest movement._

_Until the time finally came for David to take Cassandra out in the field for her first assassination mission._

_The place was Macau, and the mark was a bookie named Faizul.  Cassandra Cain tore his throat out with her bare hands._

_She was only nine years old._

_It was at this point, though details are sketchy, that Cassandra left David’s tutelage.  Being that David was willing to murder the same people in Gotham who had previously employed him in the attempt to find her again, I can only assume that her leaving was her idea._

_Cassandra Cain has been off the grid for eight years._

_Until last night, when I found her._

* * *

“I have no word on her mother,” Bruce said on the phone, finishing up.

Barbara looked down, and saw that the hand that wasn’t holding the phone was shaking with rage.

_Well, it’s nice to know the rest of my body is on the same page with my brain._

“This… is stupid,” Barbara said.

It was the only thing she could think to say.

“Cassandra Cain is quite possibly the most gifted fighter I have ever laid eyes on,” Bruce said.  “And I have no doubt that if I were to fight her with everything I have, I would lose, and lose horribly.”

“It’s still stupid,” Barbara said.  “And don’t try to justify any of this!”

“I’m not justifying anything.”

“Then what _are_ you doing?”

“Trying to make the best of a truly awful situation,” Bruce said.  “We can’t change the past, Barbara. All we can do is make something with what we have.  And what we have is someone who, with the right guidance, can save countless lives.”

Barbara sighed through clenched teeth.

“By all rights,” Bruce said.  “I should have walked in to see twenty dead bodies in that warehouse last night instead of twenty unconscious goons.  By all rights, Dollhouse and whoever was with her should be dead right now. But they aren’t. Because of her.”

Barbara parted from her righteous fury long enough to silently agree with that.  Orphan… _Cassandra…_ seemed to know right from wrong, and would not even stop at flinging Oracle against a wall to see it enforced.

_Don’t… Kill._

Never… _Kill._

“She needs more than guidance,” Barbara said.  “She needs some _help_.  She needs to be taken to someone who can get through to her on a level she can understand and appreciate.”

Bruce was silent for a while, before he said:

“Strange… I thought that’s what I did.”

And then he hung up.

* * *

It _was_ stupid, though.

Raising an assassin who couldn’t read, write, or talk was the most fuck-dumb idea Barbara could think of.

It was an employer’s dream, though: An assassin who couldn’t ask questions or haggle for higher pay.

And that was literally the only advantage Barbara could think of.

An assassin that couldn’t follow instructions, give instructions, couldn’t identify written landmarks, blend into the background of a place, or read a Goddamn map was no assassin at all.  If Cassandra Cain hadn’t gone AWOL, what was the hell was she going to do? Was David Cain going to get people to do all her reading for her? And what about the basic stuff, like on-site weapon procurement?  Resource gathering? Transportation? Establishing a safe house? Checking into a hotel? Retrieving the forged documents that would _allow_ her to check into that hotel?  Was he going to get people to do all _that_ for her, too?

Barbara couldn’t think of a bigger dead give-away for the target of an assassination than someone blowing into their city with a small army to do everything for her.

_Uh-oh!  Here comes the little Asian girl with the Floyd Mayweather-level entourage!  Best nope the fuck on outta town!_

These were the things Barbara was thinking about, standing outside the door to the bedroom in which Cassandra Cain slept.

Barbara thought Cassandra needed to know what Bruce had told her, but she really couldn’t think of anything that was up to the task.

She wondered if she’d have stood beyond that door all night, if Cassandra hadn’t started screaming.

Barbara grabbed for the door handle, to see that Cassandra hadn’t locked it.  She burst into the bedroom.

Cassandra was sitting up on bed, sweat slick on her brow and dotting the oversized green t-shirt that she must have gotten out of the drawer.

She looked over at Barbara, surprised she was standing there.

“You alright?”

Cassandra nodded.

“Have a nightmare?”

Cassandra nodded.

Barbara formed a theory in her head, and it was out of her mouth before she could stop it.

“Did you have a nightmare about that man you killed?”

Cassandra’s eyes grew wide as dinner plates, and if it were possible that Barbara could clone herself for the express purpose of kicking her own ass, she’d have gladly done so.

“Oh, whoa, hey,” Barbara said.  “I’m not gonna, like, yell at you or kick you out or anything.  It’s just that Batman’s been burning the midnight oil trying to figure out who you are, and um… Is it alright if I talked to you for a bit?”

Cassandra paused for a moment, before scooting to her right beneath the covers so Barbara could have a place to sit down.

She did so.

“I, uh… I have questions,” Barbara said.

Cassandra nodded slightly.

Barbara sighed.

“Okay, first--and I know this is on the selfish side--earlier when I told you I used to be Batgirl, you acted like you didn’t believe me.”

Cassandra was still.

“But you can read human body language, right?  You’d have known I wasn’t lying.”

“Yes,” Cassandra croaked.

“Then why didn’t you believe me?”

Cassandra lowered her brow, trying to figure out how to convey what she needed to.  She finally settled on a ghastly parody of a smile, and pointed at Barbara.

“You were just messing with me.”

“Yes.”

Barbara nodded.  Cassandra shifted her eyes downward.

“Oh, hey,” Barbara said.  “It’s cool. That’s… That at least a version of a sense of humor, so we’re alright.”

She sighed.  “This is what they call an ice-breaker in a conversation,” Barbara said.  “Start with something small, and segue into something bigger. But here we are, ice broken, and I don’t have a clue how to talk about all this.”

After a pause, Barbara looked Cassandra in the eye.

“Do you know your real name is Cassandra Cain?”

Cassandra pondered this for a bit.  She squinted, using her face to ask Barbara if she was sure.

“I’m sure,” Barbara said.  “If Batman’s sure, so am I.  That’s… that’s the name your father gave you.”

And Cassandra lit up at this.  Her mile listed off to the right side of her face, and her eyes twinkled.

The horrible situation that Barbara found herself in had just gotten exponentially worse.

“My God,” Barbara said.  “The man who… who did all of this to you, the man who made you murder for him.  You don’t know he’s your father?”

The smile and twinkle stayed on Cassandra’s face for a moment.  But the smile slackened. Her eyes went dead. And she looked away from Barbara to the middle distance in front of her.

Cassandra spoke.  When she did, it was the same kind of absent repetition that school children show for the Pledge of Allegiance.

“You are a sword,” Cassandra said, the natural rasp to her voice edging toward the watery.  “You are not the hand that wields it. You came from nothing, and if you are successful, it is to nothing that you shall return… You are an Orphan.”

Barbara’s stomach plummeted to her feet.

“Did he tell you that?”

Cassandra nodded.  Barbara remembered what Bruce told her.

“Was that the _only_ thing he told you?”

Cassandra nodded.

Barbara joined Cassandra in blankly staring off into the middle distance.  It was as though her brain were cleaning up after a drug-fueled rock band had stayed the night.  The one thought she could cling to staggered out of her mouth with a hangover.

“I need to call my dad,” Barbara said.

Cassandra turned to her.

“I want you to meet my dad one day,” Barbara said.  “Just so you know what a good one looks like. It’s a little… rough right now, but…”

Cassandra, showing a couple of signs of life, tilted her head in apparent curiosity.

“I don’t want to make this about me,” Barbara said.  “Your problems are a lot bigger than mine, I just don’t…”

Cassandra reached out, either knowingly or unwittingly flaunting the agreed-upon norms regarding personal space, and placed left her hand on Barbara’s cheek.

Barbara Gordon stared at the comforter she was sitting on, and told Cassandra her story.

About how her career as Batgirl ended at the hands of The Joker.

About the time she spent in a wheelchair.

About how she reckoned with her identity, and in so doing, crafted a new and altogether more powerful one.

About how she became Oracle.

About how three weeks ago, her body was interfered with yet again at the hands of Zatanna Zatara and her magic.

And about how no one, not her friends, not her father, not Batman, could comprehend how she felt about this.

“It’s like… It’s like I’m a tourist in a country whose language I don’t understand,” Barbara said.  “I try to tell people about why I’m angry about this, and all I get are blank stares. Or people getting angry...  Or people acting like I should be more grateful. And anyway, I’ve gone and bored you, and…

Barbara had spent all this time staring at the comforter, and she hadn’t once ventured a glance at Cassandra, so when she finally did, what she saw surprised her.

There was no room for interpretation regarding the look on the girl’s face.  The yanked-down eyebrows and pursed lips combined with the slightly glassy, sad eyes.

Cassandra Cain was _furious_ on behalf of Barbara Gordon.

She was _incensed_ that someone would use her body against her will not once, but twice.

And she was _sorry_ that it had happened to her.

 _And she would know_ , Barbara thought.

She could not find the words.  She had been screaming and screaming for three weeks, and only now had someone heard her.

Barbara sat in Cassandra’s stare.   _Bathed_ in it.   _Luxuriated_ in it.  She tried to conjure how she could show her appreciation, but her arms acted of their own accord.  She reached out and hugged Cassandra Cain as hard as she could. And Cassandra’s arms wrapped around her in return.

“I like you,” Barbara said.  “You say all the right stuff.”

The embrace broke.  Barbara shifted on the bed so that she was lying down.  Cassandra did the same. Barbara above the covers, and Cassandra below.

“You ever seen a Charlie Chaplin movie?” Barbara asked.

“No.”

“Hmm… For some weird reason, I think you’d like them.”

* * *

 

The following morning, Barbara was sitting at the computer on the top floor, looking over the names for the perspective Birds of Prey that Bruce had sent her.

The first one was the Bargain Basement Batgirl that Helena had told her about the night before.

Her name was Charlotte Gage-Radcliffe, and there was surveillance footage of her in a homemade Batgirl costume fighting a pair of muggers.  The footage showed that though she may have been remedially skilled in martial arts, she was a metahuman with teleportation powers.

Barbara would put out some feelers, maybe bring her into the fold… but that Batgirl shit had to go.

The second name was very familiar to her, and so unexpected that Barbara couldn’t help but exclaim her name aloud.

_“Zinda Blake?”_

Barbara Gordon knew the name of Zinda Blake from a report she did for her high school history class.  She was the only female member of the Blackhawk aviation squad during World War II. She had vanished sometime in 1948, only to pop up a week ago in Toledo, apparently having not aged a day since the war.  Explanations as to how this had happened were unclear.

I’m not sure I’m worthy enough to have Zinda Blake on the Birds, Barbara thought.

Cassandra came in through the door, her hair wet from a shower, wearing the same clothes she was wearing yesterday, minus the bloody sweatshirt.  She had apparently gone through Barbara's closet to find a replacement.

“Hey, Cass,” Barbara said.  “Feeling good?”

Cassandra nodded.

“Is it alright if I call you Cass?”

Cass just shrugged.

“Okay, here’s what I have planned for today,” Barbara said.  “First… I don’t feel like cooking today, so how does an encore at Big Belly Burger sound to you?”

Cassandra smiled.

“I’m not sure they serve shakes this early, though.

Cassandra smiled less.

“Just don’t get too used to it,” Barbara said.  “You’ve been malnourished for years, so you’re gonna start eating stuff that’s good for you.  After that, though, we’re gonna get you some more clothes. I make my money ripping off the Swiss bank accounts of white collar criminals, so don’t worry about cost, just worry about looking good.  Does the second part of this plan meet your approval?”

Cassandra gave a thumbs up.

“After that… Okay, do me a favor.”

Barbara cracked her knuckles.  “Do what I’m going to do with my hands, alright?”

Cassandra didn’t say anything.  She just looked at Barbara’s hands.

Barbara took a deep breath, and let off a series to twists and gestures with her hands and fingers, doing them quickly.  She had spent the last two hours on various sites trying to get it right.

“Now you,” Barbara said.

And Cassandra did with her hands what Barbara had done, at the same speed and without error, the fingers of her right hand compensating for the cast that the arm was in.  She had even replicated Barbara’s pauses.

Barbara smiled.  Her theory about this had just been proven correct.

 _“‘The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog,’”_ Barbara said.  “That sentence has every letter in the alphabet… and you just said it in American Sign Language.”

Cassandra just blinked at her, before looking at her still displayed hands.

“All brain power is created equal,” Barbara said.  “If your asshole father trained you in the periodic table for the first nine years of your life instead of how to hurt people, you’d have a Nobel Prize in chemistry by now.  You… Are not… Stupid, and I will tell you that, often and repeatedly, because it’s true. If you can learn how to fight, you can learn sign language. If you can learn sign language, you can learn to read, and if you can learn to read, you can learn to talk.  I don’t know sign language, so I’ll be learning it with you. It is going to be a slow-motion pain in the ass, but if I can do it, you can do it a mile better… Now does this sound like something you’d like to do after we get back from buying you clothes.”

Cassandra looked at Barbara, and put her hands by her side.  She seemed to expand in her stance, cutting a heroic pose whose figure and profile would look at home standing next to Wonder Woman or Blue Beetle.

_Or Oracle, come to think of it._

Cassandra nodded.

Barbara smiled.

“Attagirl.”

* * *

**_TO BE CONTINUED_ **


End file.
